The Ups and Downs of Talking Trans Genitalia

When I began my transition three years ago, I was confronted with how many things cisgender people do without a thought that I'd no longer be able to, such as choosing clothes to wear to the beach, going out to bars and parties, or talking on the phone without hyper-analyzing the sound of my own voice.

One of the biggest things, though, was sex.

Of course, regardless of your gender identity, you can still have fears, concerns or questions about sex and who you sleep with, but it goes double for trans people and the people who have sex with them. Language is constantly evolving, and it's easy to get lost in technicalities, especially when people's feelings are at stake.

But just so you know, we "special snowflakes" aren't "attention-seeking." If anything, we want our lives to pan out as smoothly as anybody else's, and we often wish it didn't take any extra work on behalf of other people.

A lose-lose scenario

Although I hate to say it out loud, being trans does require extra thought and care. For me, this is for many reasons, with the two biggest being how men who are romantically interested in trans women treat me and how men who are not interested in trans women treat me. The latter often go so far as to match with me on dating sites just to say terrible things to me and make comments on my appearance.

After going through this scenario multiple times, I began to spiral and became very self-critical. No wonder, really: The very people I wished were attracted to me were quite often the ones trying to ruin my self-esteem.

Eventually, I began making connections with men who were interested in trans women, hoping I could finally put the past behind me in regard to dysphoria and dating…only to have it increase 10-fold. You see, cisgender, heterosexual people have it a bit easier in the bedroom as they've been taught from childhood what sex "should" look like. Once you move away from cis/straight relationships, there are so many variables that make sex super-dynamic and interesting or, as in my case, confusing and difficult.

Because of this, it seemed as if every man I met—regardless of orientation—had a very inaccurate view of what sex with a transgender woman might be like. They expected me to be either very submissive, gentle and easily overpowered or aggressive, domineering and greedy in bed. I was never given the freedom to reside somewhere in the middle, which is where I naturally fall.

The clit issue

Something else to mention is what some people end up being taught about trans people, either by pornography, the media or sometimes even trans people themselves: All trans women refer to their genitalia as their "clit" or "clitty."

I'm not entirely sure where this originated, but it does not work for me. Now, of course, I understand the logic. Trans people can sometimes have a lot of stress and panic relating to their body parts, and sometimes referring to them by other names can help them discuss things with people without spiraling into a depressive state. But this leaves other trans women who don't have a lot of dysphoria surrounding their genitals—such as myself—having to explain to others why we don't use those terms.

The word itself isn't a problem. Every person is entitled to say and do whatever makes them feel comfortable during sex. What is a problem is turning the trans experience into a monolith, and going into a sexual encounter assuming you know everything there is to know, because you heard some lingo through the grapevine—or, god forbid, from porn online.

It's not groundbreaking to talk to your partner about their preferences before you get intimate with them, and it's no different for trans people.

The other clit issue

Another important thing to mention about how trans people reference their genitalia is that the intended audience is everything. It's not just what word a person is comfortable with for themselves, it also matters what the people around them are comfortable with.

For example, some cis lesbians have argued that referring to male genitalia with terms oriented to females essentially strips them of their womanhood. In some parts of the world, women are mutilated to remove or damage the clitoris. With such a level of violence leveled against female anatomy, it's not unreasonable that some women don't want the vocabulary of their sex co-opted.

Most conversations concerning this point get derailed quickly. Cisgender women who don't want trans women to call their genitalia by female terms are often dismissed as TERFs, or trans-exclusionary radical feminists. It's assumed TERFs don't even care about the women facing genital mutilation and are only invested in invalidating trans women. If this is true, somebody has to worry about the heart of the matter, don't they?

Transgender women have a responsibility to ensure that the way we conduct ourselves is authentic and does not interfere with or meddle in other people's lives. All women should feel safe and comfortable to be around you, and if that means simply changing a word in your vocabulary—or even just not using that word around them—and you refuse to do so, you need to reevaluate your priorities.

So what do we do? The best way forward, as it is with so many things in life, is to communicate about it. Someone acting uncomfortable or weird when you refer to yourself in one way or another? Talk about it. Going to have sex with someone and don't know what to call what? Talk about it. Sex should be a fun, invigorating experience for everybody, and when it isn't, we have to assess what's going wrong and work together to fix it.